Where to Start?
So much has happened in the last few days, most of it great, some of it scary; throw in lack of sleep and eating nothing but sugar and you get a catastrophic combination resulting in memory loss and brain farts.
Sunday/Easter:
We met up with a friend of Travis' that he helped convert while on his mission; he used to be a Catholic Monk and so I found him to be a man of very few words, however, very nice. He picked us up at the hotel and we went to church with him. It was a German ward.... with maybe a handful of Germans and then Americans as far as the eye could see (it was the airforce base ward :) Afterwards Christopher (Trav's friend) drove us all over the countryside and showed us some magnificent views of which I couldn't get pictures of thanks to my dead camera!
We picked Troy and Lacey up at the hotel and spent the rest of the day in Trier just sightseeing and the two highlights of the day were St. Paulin's Church & Mandersheid Castle. Pictures to come from Lacey's camera.
Monday:
We woke up early and made our drive to Southern Germany and visited Heidelberg & Rotenburg an der Talba. I wish we had had more time in Rotenburg, I think it was by far the the neatest of the towns. Although while we were in Heidelberg we hiked up to see another castle, and I think it had the most gorgeous grounds of all the castles. Overall the day was amazing and I wish we had had more time, more energy, more handle on where we were going, and more camera life to have really soaked in this last day of our trip! Tomorrow we fly to Zurick and layover for three hours and then fly back to warsaw on a 2hr flight... then a 3hr car ride back to Lublin... yuck. I do not look forward to tomorrow. Too bad it will be here in 5mins.
And sorry I did not post yesterday with better details of the day while they were fresh in my head. I had planned on posting, but I hopped on the internet to find some information that kept me on the phone for quite some time. My grandfather has suffered a heart attack and they had to put him in an induced coma. Blessedly things lined up just so that he's doing wonderfully considering... and my family reported everything should be fine:) Then... we received some other big news from a my dad about the health of a neighbor that just made my heart hurt. Thankfully we ended the night talking to my in laws who delivered some really good news and helped turn our night back around.
I'm so thankful for the internet so I can stay connected to my family!
Monday, April 9, 2012
Saturday, April 7, 2012
3rd day of our German Adventure
Each day I'm waking up with a little less energy to make it through the day... and I think everyone else is feeling the same. Maddix slept in until 8:20am this morning and it was incredible, except I was up long before that because I can't sleep in anymore.
Today's journey led us into Berg Eltz: Home to a gorgeous castle! :) I told Travis after seeing it, I'm itching for some property, and the longer I stayed at the castle, the more it seemed to suit me! We took a tour there and took time walking all around the grounds. Maddix was a little exhaustive today with his constant whining, his 'give me give me' syndrome, and his overly tiredness. Plus just as we were about to start our tour of the castle Maddix peed through his diaper, soaking his pants and causing us to miss our tour and wait another 40minutes... then he whined and through a fit all through the castle; no surprise he fell asleep instantly when we got to the car. We were all so tired we drove through our next destination and didn't even get out because we were all napping in the car.
We finished our day out in Bern Kastel-Kues which was much different from the other German towns we've visited so far and I think it was my favorite; so of course the camera died right when we got there!!! Lacey and Troy took some photos for us but I don't have any of them for now :(. We enjoyed a restaurant called Italia Pizza where I ate my first Calzone, and then continued walking around enjoying all the sights... and the CLOSED shops for the Easter weekend (what a bust of a weekend to come in terms of people being out and shops being open).
At the end of the night we all wanted nothing more than to check into the hotel and relax for the evening, so when we pulled up to this iffy looking hotel in an iffy neighborhood... Troy and Lacey had some serious doubts, and Travis was feeling some pressure for having picked the hotel. :) oh boy. So it just got worse as the people led us out of the main building through a back door, into a parking corridore, into a building that looked like a parking garage, and then up four flights of stairs to our rooms. Uh huh, so we opened the room door and our tv is straight from the 70's; it is so fat and tiny that it's almost a joke and the rest of the room isn't much to report on. There was some debate on changing the hotel quickly, but in the end we set up shop and now Maddix has been running around like crazy all night. You'd think he'd crash but no. He's currently whining himself to sleep next to the bed.
I tell you what, he's a good baby; well behaved, smart, responsive, so cute that everywhere we go people just eat him up, BUT.... BUT... at the end of the day after you've carried this 30lb boy EVERYWHERE and changed I don't know HOW MANY leak through diapers (We did go buy some different and bigger ones today), and just put up with him screaming inches from your ear for hours I can't think of any parents out there who wouldn't be DONE WITH HIM for the night. I almost fear tomorrow and carrying him all over again. My arms or extremely tired. We planned on buying a stroller here since we couldn't get one in Lublin, but again, it's Easter weekend and every shop has been closed since we got here, so the carrying continues. And then to top it off my stupid camera bag had the WRONG cord in it so my camera is officially DEAD for the remainder of the trip!!! Sure we can get some with the Potter's camera but I'm still so sad.... sigh. I just need to go to bed, Madddix... go to sleep please:) We've had enough.
Today's journey led us into Berg Eltz: Home to a gorgeous castle! :) I told Travis after seeing it, I'm itching for some property, and the longer I stayed at the castle, the more it seemed to suit me! We took a tour there and took time walking all around the grounds. Maddix was a little exhaustive today with his constant whining, his 'give me give me' syndrome, and his overly tiredness. Plus just as we were about to start our tour of the castle Maddix peed through his diaper, soaking his pants and causing us to miss our tour and wait another 40minutes... then he whined and through a fit all through the castle; no surprise he fell asleep instantly when we got to the car. We were all so tired we drove through our next destination and didn't even get out because we were all napping in the car.
We finished our day out in Bern Kastel-Kues which was much different from the other German towns we've visited so far and I think it was my favorite; so of course the camera died right when we got there!!! Lacey and Troy took some photos for us but I don't have any of them for now :(. We enjoyed a restaurant called Italia Pizza where I ate my first Calzone, and then continued walking around enjoying all the sights... and the CLOSED shops for the Easter weekend (what a bust of a weekend to come in terms of people being out and shops being open).
At the end of the night we all wanted nothing more than to check into the hotel and relax for the evening, so when we pulled up to this iffy looking hotel in an iffy neighborhood... Troy and Lacey had some serious doubts, and Travis was feeling some pressure for having picked the hotel. :) oh boy. So it just got worse as the people led us out of the main building through a back door, into a parking corridore, into a building that looked like a parking garage, and then up four flights of stairs to our rooms. Uh huh, so we opened the room door and our tv is straight from the 70's; it is so fat and tiny that it's almost a joke and the rest of the room isn't much to report on. There was some debate on changing the hotel quickly, but in the end we set up shop and now Maddix has been running around like crazy all night. You'd think he'd crash but no. He's currently whining himself to sleep next to the bed.
I tell you what, he's a good baby; well behaved, smart, responsive, so cute that everywhere we go people just eat him up, BUT.... BUT... at the end of the day after you've carried this 30lb boy EVERYWHERE and changed I don't know HOW MANY leak through diapers (We did go buy some different and bigger ones today), and just put up with him screaming inches from your ear for hours I can't think of any parents out there who wouldn't be DONE WITH HIM for the night. I almost fear tomorrow and carrying him all over again. My arms or extremely tired. We planned on buying a stroller here since we couldn't get one in Lublin, but again, it's Easter weekend and every shop has been closed since we got here, so the carrying continues. And then to top it off my stupid camera bag had the WRONG cord in it so my camera is officially DEAD for the remainder of the trip!!! Sure we can get some with the Potter's camera but I'm still so sad.... sigh. I just need to go to bed, Madddix... go to sleep please:) We've had enough.
Friday, April 6, 2012
2nd day of our German Adventure
Man I love Friday's, there so good, yes? No. Not when they're good Friday...
A major plan for our day today was going to be taking Lacey and Troy to the amazing shops in Kohln (Cologne), but they were closed; everything was closed. Before we knew all this, this is how we began our day:
After being extremely wary of the quality of this hotel after pulling up yesterday, all our faith was rewarded when we showed up to the included breakfast this morning; it was heaven on a plate. THIS made the Lublin hotel breakfast I raved about look like our dinky continental breakfasts back home. We had EVERYTHING, and we ate like kings.
Afterward we drove along a road that paralleled the Mozel (river) in and out of miles of trees, and there were old towns and churches just built into the mountains. The drive was beautiful and it took us to the Haribo Candy Factory (the best gummy/candy manufacturer there is). When we got there we found it closed; we found the whole town closed and not a single person out and about. We snapped photos and left.
NEXT we made our way to the Kohln Cathedral which I found myself blown away by. It-was-HUGE. We went it and walked up the winding staircase all the way to the tallest tower. It made me sick. It wore me out. It was amazing.
We then made our way Aachen (awkhin) where we checked out the town building, a church, some more CLOSED shops... grr.. and just did some sight seeing. We went to a quaint Chocolate shop where I had a new experience. We purchased Hot Chocolates by selecting a flavor of hard block chocolate with a spoon stuck in it. Then, before paying you take everything you selected to a little table on the patio and they bring you some hot cream/milk. We placed the spoon with the chocolate on the end into the drink and stirred it until it was completely melted. I don't like hot chocolate, but I LOVED this stuff. We enjoyed this little cafe while Travis ran off to find a friend he had that he'd planned to meet up with. When we found him we then made our way to tour through the church where CHARLEMAGNE was crowned King and now housed his remains. We saw his tomb and and the church was immaculate. It was quite the experience.
~ We also ate some Italian ice. ~
My FAVORITE part of the day was when we made our to this fountain in the middle of a large courtyard and found two little boys scooting around on these two little wooden bikes that were self pushers. Maddix chased them around the fountain over and over again. Eventually one of the boys shared his bike and Maddix took many a turns chasing the boys. The parents explained to me that the dad was from Turkey but had lived in Germany for a long time, the mom was Romanian but lived in Hungry just before Aachen and that their boys spoke German, Turkish, Romanian, and a little Hungarian... and they were only 5 and 3... TRAVIS, teach our son German please. So a bit later our boys attracted another set of parents with a baby boy Maddix's age. He got down and played with them and the parents told me they were from Switzerland but were visiting Germany on Holiday:) By the end we even had one more friend join us. She was the most beautiful little girl I've ever seen. She was riding a long on her scooter keeping up with they boys and her father told us that he was Syrian and his wife was french... resulting in this gorgeous little angel. Maddix had so much fun with those kids and they all played so wonderfully. None of them knew each others language, or the cultural differences, and yet they worked together harmoniously. In fact I I've never seen kids share their toys the way they all did today. The boys kept rotating Maddix in on their bikes (Maddix was the poop SCREAMING every time his turn was over), the little girl kept sharing her scooter with the Swedish boy and it was just cute. It was by far the highlight of this trip:)
We then had Travis' friend take us to his favorite restaurant and we dined on some "food for the common people," or what you would eat if a German woman invited you into her home for dinner; it stuffed us for the night and we were all done for. We barely made it back to the hotel and I had to hurry and write this day down before I forgot it! This trip has so fun and Troy and Lacey have been so amazing to be here with. Hope they know how much we appreciate their company!
Thursday, April 5, 2012
1st day to our German Adventure
1:05am: Alarm rings and I think, "can it really be time to get up already?"
After packing the rest of our things we hopped on a taxi van that we shared with another student and made our way for our 6:30am flight from Warsaw to Frankfurt.
10:00am: Made our walk (with all our bags, car seat, and Maddix in hand) to the Frankfurt temple, only to find out to that our stupid late flight made us miss our opportunity to do any temple work:( So we walked around the grounds then made our way back to the Train Station to hop a train to the car rental shop.
Beginning of our trip:
We began in Wetzlar- enjoying all the gorgeous sights, made our way to Braunsfeld where we had lunch and Maddix found a puppy to play with and we walked around a castle. When then ended the night in a town called, Limburg an der Lahn which had a lot of narrow streets with tons of old buildings. We walked around a few churches and took it all in.
To end the night we made our way to the hotel Travis found on the internet.... The rooms we're in are decent with comfy beds, but the outside of it is... quite an eyesore! It looks like a Mexican joint that was trying to be Greek :) Hopefully Troy and Lacey can handle it ha ha. oh boy.
So you can bed that after having Maddi up since 1:45am, with him NOT sleeping in the van, or on the plane, that he finally fell asleep right when the plane touched down... boo. We carried him around like a heavy rag doll in our arms for around an hour before he woke up (he was surprisingly good on the flight), he held it together through the day with some touch and go fits, and passed out in the car and off but never for long enough, and was NEVER happy to wake up! But he was a trooper and hung in there with us. When we got up to the room we bought him some milk, changed his bum (which was FULL of cranberries from the car ride... OOPS), and then he passed out; now it's my turn. Goodnight.
That's all for day one. Pictures will be uploaded to facebook later.
P.s. Colors were inspired by our colorful Hotel:)
Wednesday, April 4, 2012
Germany Trip's Eve
Today... Well you can imagine how today went with it being the day before our big trip:) It was everything preparatory for leaving at 2am tomorrow morning! We cleaned, did laundry (which I'm still waiting for my jeans to dry from; this is one of the moments I dream of having a laundry machine), packed, Trav and Maddix went for a walk, and ... well everything else that needed to be done.
We're going to be heading to bed here shortly, hence this early post. But in 6hrs our taxi will take us to the airport in Warsaw and by 6:30am We will be boarding our flight and on our way to another new country. Maddix is just shy of 18months and we will already of been to three countries!! Well the next post you receive from us will be in GERMANY:) Night!
Tuesday, April 3, 2012
Our First Few days of April
Yesterday: Travis was mostly free from school and finished his last midterm in the morning! So he came home around lunch time
Today:
Travis didn't have to wake up and study! And Maddix stayed in bed until 7am! We had a very pleasant scripture reading this morning and then Travis left to school while Maddix and I went about our morning routine. Travis quickly returned home only having one class and I ran across the street to go running with his classmate, Ceena, whom I ran with the other day.
When I picked up her up I found out that three of the boys decided to come running as well. It was such a blast! Because there were so many of us... and all colored (except muah) we flagged a LOT of stares from the people. Seriously... I thought I was running in a parade the way people jumped out of our way and stared at us. At the end Kohsee challenged me to a sprint and it felt SO GOOD to open up and run as hard as I could! I've been constantly holding back here as to not leave anyone behind, but this time I didn't have too. I really hope something like today's running group forms again.
When I got home Maddix was napping so Trav and I enjoyed some more Settlers of Catan; I'm addicted, I don't want to give it back to the Elders:) Then tonight we had YW/YM.
And also, today Maddix went number two on the toilet!!!! He was just standing in the front room, looked up at me and said, "poop," so I rushed him to the bathroom and he did it!!!! This earned him another cookie, although I probably shouldn't have after what he ate this morning. Ceena was sweet enough to by Maddix a GIANT Kinder egg for an early Easter present and well.. you'll see what happened:
And those was our amazing two days!
- Scriptures and family prayer
- P90 X for Maddix and I (he is getting strong)
- Had the elders over for Omelettes and Settlers of Catan (Which Trav Dominates at)
- Had some awesome playtime with Maddix including Hide and seek, coloring, dancing, and cars
- Something BIG and AWESOME happened
- That night we held our first ever Family Home evening! It was amazing. We sang Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam and threw Maddix back and forth on every 'beam' portion of the song. Then we watched the fourth session of conference as a family and then ate a quick dinner.
- We did a little reading time and put Maddix to bed. And for the first time in a LONG time without it being late, Travis and I enjoyed a movie that he stayed up for the entire portion of and then went to bed by 10:30am.
Today:
Travis didn't have to wake up and study! And Maddix stayed in bed until 7am! We had a very pleasant scripture reading this morning and then Travis left to school while Maddix and I went about our morning routine. Travis quickly returned home only having one class and I ran across the street to go running with his classmate, Ceena, whom I ran with the other day.
When I picked up her up I found out that three of the boys decided to come running as well. It was such a blast! Because there were so many of us... and all colored (except muah) we flagged a LOT of stares from the people. Seriously... I thought I was running in a parade the way people jumped out of our way and stared at us. At the end Kohsee challenged me to a sprint and it felt SO GOOD to open up and run as hard as I could! I've been constantly holding back here as to not leave anyone behind, but this time I didn't have too. I really hope something like today's running group forms again.
When I got home Maddix was napping so Trav and I enjoyed some more Settlers of Catan; I'm addicted, I don't want to give it back to the Elders:) Then tonight we had YW/YM.
And also, today Maddix went number two on the toilet!!!! He was just standing in the front room, looked up at me and said, "poop," so I rushed him to the bathroom and he did it!!!! This earned him another cookie, although I probably shouldn't have after what he ate this morning. Ceena was sweet enough to by Maddix a GIANT Kinder egg for an early Easter present and well.. you'll see what happened:
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| He ripped the egg out of the foil and was eating it before we even registered what was going on |
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| Building the toy that came in the egg |
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| Shoveling it in like he hadn't eaten in days |
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| Annnnddd.... done. In about a minute flat he had half the Kinder egg devoured! |
Sunday, April 1, 2012
~Conference is the WORST...... April Fools! Ha Ha, We LOVE it!~
Oh how I love conference weekend. I have two favorite times of the year and they're not Christmas or July 4th as some would think. It's actually the first weekend of April and October. Nothing makes me happier than getting ready for conference and really taking in the words of the Prophets and Apostles! So you won't be surprised that this conference has been on of my favorite of all...
Saturday's Session:
This is Maddix helping me prepare a list of questions we wanted addressed during conference... and enjoying some snacks.
It was very odd to wake up Saturday, knowing it was conference weekend, and that we still needed to go about our day BEFORE we watched conference. To be honest... I really liked it. I loved fully waking up, getting the house all in order, preparing a list of questions, listening to church hymns, and just fully preparing to receive our answers.
We were fortunate enough to have the Elders and an investigator (same one we had for dinner last week) come over for conference. We plugged one of our lap tops into the T.V. and streamed the online version, while we turned on our second lap top with some headphones and streamed the Polish audio so the investigator to watch the T.v. while hearing it in Polish. It was an incredible session. I had written down three questions and in the first two talks they were directly addressed, and one was answered almost word for word from what I'd written. Then we put Maddix to bed and prepared for the second session to begin (10:00pm-12:00am). I really enjoyed that session (Trav was out in the first 5mins) until the last 45mins hit and I was exhausted! But I made it....took care of something.... and went to bed.
Sunday's General Conference/ April Fool's
Trav woke up this morning and heard Maddix in the other room, as well as the sun beaming through the window. He looked at the phone and it said it was 4am. He was confused so I mumbled from my sleep, "What's the matter?" He was very confused so I added, "Just check the other phone." It again said 4am, and as we have no clocks in the apt he had to go off the phones:) he was so confused, and so BUGGED that the sun was up... waking up Maddix if it was still in the middle of the night and just stood there confused. APRIL FOOLS!! I'd switched the phones before bed ha-HA.
Oh I thought I was so clever. But then I looked out the window to see that Mother Nature pulled an even BETTER April Fool's joke:
We have snow. April Fools to all those who thought Spring was here.
I think maybe the Lord was just making it that much easier for us to stay home inside to watch Conference:) And to play as a family again while we waited for the next sessions to start:
While Maddix took his nap we had the Elders back over for Priesthood session. At least that's what we planned, but the website was down for maintanence so we talked for awhile and then about an hour it was back up and we watched the priesthood session, and later Maddix joined us. After they left we played some more and talked to family.
The Elders came back for the 3rd session. The investigator was going to come back with them, but he got in a car wreck (not major; fender bender) and so the four of us (and Maddix) enjoyed some more of conference and now as the last session is starting I'm torn between listening to it live and partaking of the spirit right now and saving it for Family Night tomorrow when I'm more awake; I think that's best.
Goodnight then. I hope this April Fool's Day/Conference Weekend has been everything you needed to be and that we can all be better people from it! Love Conference! Love it here in Poland. Love having the Elders over for Conference.
Saturday's Session:
This is Maddix helping me prepare a list of questions we wanted addressed during conference... and enjoying some snacks.
We were fortunate enough to have the Elders and an investigator (same one we had for dinner last week) come over for conference. We plugged one of our lap tops into the T.V. and streamed the online version, while we turned on our second lap top with some headphones and streamed the Polish audio so the investigator to watch the T.v. while hearing it in Polish. It was an incredible session. I had written down three questions and in the first two talks they were directly addressed, and one was answered almost word for word from what I'd written. Then we put Maddix to bed and prepared for the second session to begin (10:00pm-12:00am). I really enjoyed that session (Trav was out in the first 5mins) until the last 45mins hit and I was exhausted! But I made it....took care of something.... and went to bed.
Sunday's General Conference/ April Fool's
Trav woke up this morning and heard Maddix in the other room, as well as the sun beaming through the window. He looked at the phone and it said it was 4am. He was confused so I mumbled from my sleep, "What's the matter?" He was very confused so I added, "Just check the other phone." It again said 4am, and as we have no clocks in the apt he had to go off the phones:) he was so confused, and so BUGGED that the sun was up... waking up Maddix if it was still in the middle of the night and just stood there confused. APRIL FOOLS!! I'd switched the phones before bed ha-HA.
Oh I thought I was so clever. But then I looked out the window to see that Mother Nature pulled an even BETTER April Fool's joke:
I think maybe the Lord was just making it that much easier for us to stay home inside to watch Conference:) And to play as a family again while we waited for the next sessions to start:
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| Maddix had his first 'color on myself' moment today.. Can barely see it here |
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| This is their new game that play. It leaves Maddix screaming " 'gain, a'gain!" |
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| So I folded up our bed into a couch for when the Elder's came over and moved on to cleaning another room and the realize Maddix had disappeared. I found him in the base of our futon, hiding:O) He thinks he's so cute; and he's completely right! |
The Elders came back for the 3rd session. The investigator was going to come back with them, but he got in a car wreck (not major; fender bender) and so the four of us (and Maddix) enjoyed some more of conference and now as the last session is starting I'm torn between listening to it live and partaking of the spirit right now and saving it for Family Night tomorrow when I'm more awake; I think that's best.
Goodnight then. I hope this April Fool's Day/Conference Weekend has been everything you needed to be and that we can all be better people from it! Love Conference! Love it here in Poland. Love having the Elders over for Conference.
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